Gadget Gives You Yet Another Way to Watch TV

It's like a DVR for your DVR

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The Hauppage HD DVR gives you a way to record TV, games or anything else that's plugged into the device.

If you find yourself wishing for more ways to watch TV, get your wallet out because this week's featured gadget is right up your alley.

The Hauppage HD DVR is a box that sits on top of your DVR (or DVD, or xBox or whatever) and records everything that runs through the device.

The truth is, you will either say to yourself, "Wow, I could totally use the Hauppage HD DVR!" or "I have NO idea what you would need that for."

"It's like red and blue states -- they'll never see the other guy's point of view.

So get ready for this: it's like a DVR for your DVR.

The video signal (from your DVR, your DVD, your xBox...whatever) passes through the unit and continues onto your TV. You watch as normal, but in the background the device is recording the video and transcoding it into the QuickTime H.264 format, a very high-quality, low-size digital file.

You can play this kind of file on your iPod. That's one of the things you might use it for -- to record TV to your iPod. You could also use it the way I've been using it: to record game video from an xBox (which I then show on TV). You could record your games and e-mail your great kills to friends.

You could actually record a Blockbuster DVD to your iPod but that would be illegal.